Jim Beckwourth was an African American who played a major role in the early exploration and
settlement of the American West. Although there were people of many races and nationalities on
the frontier, Beckwourth was the only African American who recorded his life story, and his adventures
took him from the everglades of Florida to the Pacific Ocean and from southern Canada to northern Mexico.

He dictated his autobiography to Thomas D. Bonner, an itinerant Justice of the Peace in the gold fields of
California, in 1854-55. After Bonner "polished up" Beckwourth's rough narrative, The Life and Adventures
of James P. Beckwourth, Mountaineer, Scout, and Pioneer, and Chief of the Crow Nation of Indians
was published by Harper and Brothers in 1856. The book apparently achieved a certain amount of popular
success, for it was followed by an English edition in the same year, a second printing
two years later, and a French translation in 1860.

Beckwourth's role in American history was often dismissed by historians
of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Many were quite blatant in their prejudices, refusing
to give any credence to a "mongrel of mixed blood." And many of his acquaintances considered the book
something of a joke.

But Beckwourth was a man of his times, and for the early fur trappers of the Rockies, the ability to "spin
a good yarn" was a skill valued almost as highly as marksmanship or woodsmanship. And while Beckwourth
certainly had a tendency to exaggerate numbers or to occasionally make himself the hero of events that
happened to other people, later historians have discovered that much of what Beckwourth related in his
autobiography actually occurred.

Truth is often something much bigger than merely the accuracy of details. And to discover the truth of
what life was like for the fur trappers of the 1820's, the Crow Indians of the 1830's, the pioneers of the
Southwest in the 1840's, or the gold miners of California in the 1850's, you can find no better source than the
life of Jim Beckwourth.

The Gaudy LiarAn often-told story has it that when the book appeared, a group of miners who were
well-acquainted with Beckwourth commissioned one of its members to pick up a copy while on a trip to
San Francisco. But the man, being careless, got a copy of the Bible instead. In the evening, he was requested to
read aloud from the long-awaited book, and opening it at random, he hit upon and read the story of Samson
and the foxes.

"That'll do!" one of the men cried. "I'd know that story for one of Jim's lies anywhere!"
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